South Shore Breast Center on the move

Monday

Sep 28, 2009 at 12:01 AMSep 28, 2009 at 7:59 PM

The South Shore Breast Center is moving to its new home at Dana Farber/Brigham and Women’s cancer center at South Shore Hospital this week. But its core mission – serving the special needs of women with breast disease – remains the same.

Allison Manning

The South Shore Breast Center is moving to its new home at Dana Farber/Brigham and Women’s cancer center at South Shore Hospital this week. But its core mission - serving the special needs of women with breast disease - remains the same.

There was no standardized care for breast cancer when South Shore Breast Center founders conceived of the practice in 2000.

“Women needed a place where they could get comprehensive breast care,” center director Dr. Suniti Nimbkar said.

Since the center opened in 2001, Dr. Nimbkar and her team have worked to bring the most advanced treatments to patients, focusing solely on diseases of the breast.

Each Monday, the team takes part in a “comprehensive breast conference,” discussing in a multidisciplinary fashion every patient diagnosed in the last week.

“The care of women with breast cancer is really individually tailored to the patient,” said Dr. Nimbkar, who has been at the center since the beginning and took over as director in 2007.

A nurse practitioner ushers each patient through her journey, from diagnosis to treatment. It is a personalized approach that is rare at other hospitals, Dr. Nimbkar said.

“Patients at all points in the process feel like they have someone to reach out to and they have a lot of knowledge, making them feel powerful,” she said.

When she was diagnosed with breast cancer last December, Carla Wahnon, 44, chose the breast center over hospitals in Boston, even though she lives in Cambridge. The undivided attention and respect she received from Dr. Nimbkar and her team quelled her uncertainties about her diagnosis.

“I didn’t leave any questions in my mind that that’s the place I wanted to go,” Wahnon said. “And they were the people I wanted to treat me. If they moved to China, I would make my commute there,” she said.

Wahnon, now cancer-free, appreciated the intimate setting at the center, and the availability of the nurse practitioner and other physicians.

“At all moments and stages of your treatment you feel like you’re being accompanied by a professional,” she said.

The new cancer center at South Shore Hospital will allow the South Shore Breast Center team to use integrative therapies such as massage, yoga and reiki within the same facility. There will also be a facility social worker, one of the most important resources for a woman coping with cancer, Dr. Nimbkar said.

“There are so many issues that a social worker can help with, from the financial issues … all the way to the issues of, ‘How do I explain this to my 12-year-old daughter?’” Dr. Nimbkar said.

The breast care center cares for 250 patients a year, resulting in 400 visits a month. The practice has seen a 20 percent growth in the last year, as women from far beyond the South Shore area take advantage of the center’s resources.

“You want to become a magnet for people who want to practice to the same standards,” Nimbkar said. “We’ve been able to do that.”

“I really do believe we’ve become a regional center of excellence,” she said.